AP Interview: Fine accuser felt he `owed' coach

This photo made Dec. 21, 2011 shows former Syracuse ball boy Bobby Davis talking to a reporter during an interview in Syracuse, N.Y. Davis was a basketball-crazy teen who was handed a virtual all-access pass to the world of big-time college hoops by Syracuse assistant coach Bernie Fine. Davis, now 39 and the prime accuser in the sexual abuse scandal at Syracuse University, says the indebtedness he felt toward Fine made it hard to break from the man he claims molested him throughout his teens and into his late 20s. (AP Photo/David Duprey)
— AP

This photo made Dec. 21, 2011 shows former Syracuse ball boy Bobby Davis talking to a reporter during an interview in Syracuse, N.Y. Davis was a basketball-crazy teen who was handed a virtual all-access pass to the world of big-time college hoops by Syracuse assistant coach Bernie Fine. Davis, now 39 and the prime accuser in the sexual abuse scandal at Syracuse University, says the indebtedness he felt toward Fine made it hard to break from the man he claims molested him throughout his teens and into his late 20s. (AP Photo/David Duprey)
/ AP

This photo made Dec. 21, 2011 shows former Syracuse ball boy Bobby Davis talking to a reporter during an interview in Syracuse, N.Y. Davis was a basketball-crazy teen who was handed a virtual all-access pass to the world of big-time college hoops by Syracuse assistant coach Bernie Fine. Davis, now 39 and the prime accuser in the sexual abuse scandal at Syracuse University, says the indebtedness he felt toward Fine made it hard to break from the man he claims molested him throughout his teens and into his late 20s. (AP Photo/David Duprey)— AP

This photo made Dec. 21, 2011 shows former Syracuse ball boy Bobby Davis talking to a reporter during an interview in Syracuse, N.Y. Davis was a basketball-crazy teen who was handed a virtual all-access pass to the world of big-time college hoops by Syracuse assistant coach Bernie Fine. Davis, now 39 and the prime accuser in the sexual abuse scandal at Syracuse University, says the indebtedness he felt toward Fine made it hard to break from the man he claims molested him throughout his teens and into his late 20s. (AP Photo/David Duprey)
/ AP

This photo made Dec. 21, 2011 shows former Syracuse ball boy Bobby Davis posed before an interview in Syracuse, N.Y. Davis was a basketball-crazy teen who was handed a virtual all-access pass to the world of big-time college hoops by Syracuse assistant coach Bernie Fine. Davis, now 39 and the prime accuser in the sexual abuse scandal at Syracuse University, says the indebtedness he felt toward Fine made it hard to break from the man he claims molested him throughout his teens and into his late 20s. (AP Photo/David Duprey)— AP

This photo made Dec. 21, 2011 shows former Syracuse ball boy Bobby Davis posed before an interview in Syracuse, N.Y. Davis was a basketball-crazy teen who was handed a virtual all-access pass to the world of big-time college hoops by Syracuse assistant coach Bernie Fine. Davis, now 39 and the prime accuser in the sexual abuse scandal at Syracuse University, says the indebtedness he felt toward Fine made it hard to break from the man he claims molested him throughout his teens and into his late 20s. (AP Photo/David Duprey)
/ AP

SYRACUSE, N.Y. 
Bobby Davis was a basketball-crazy teen who was handed a virtual all-access pass to the world of big-time college hoops by Syracuse assistant coach Bernie Fine. As a ball boy for Hall of Famer Jim Boeheim's squad during the 1980s, Davis heard halftime locker-room tirades from the legendary coach, took shots at practice, sat courtside, hit the road and ate nice dinners.

Davis, now 39 and the prime accuser in the sexual abuse scandal at Syracuse University, says the indebtedness he felt toward Fine made it hard to break from the man he claims molested him throughout his teens and into his late 20s.

"I wanted to be around basketball so bad," Davis said in an interview with The Associated Press.

"As I got older, I understood more that Bernie had this power. You almost feel it's like a cult in a sense. You don't know how to get away," he said. "And as more and more time went on, you feel indebted to him. You feel like you owe him. He'd always remind me of all the good things he did for me: `I'm the first one who got you a steak dinner. ... I took you to these restaurants. I took you to these hotels.'"

Davis and his stepbrother Mike Lang claim they were repeatedly forcibly touched in the 1980s by Fine, who has since been fired. Davis and Lang last week filed a defamation lawsuit against the university and Boeheim, who initially called Davis a liar and opportunist looking to cash in on the publicity surrounding the Penn State sex abuse scandal.

Fine has denied the allegations. He has not spoken publicly in the month since the allegations were raised, and his lawyers declined to comment Thursday.

During an interview Wednesday night with the AP, Davis said the abuse would sometimes occur in Fine's campus office with secretaries just beyond the closed door, in Fine's home, at Syracuse University basketball camp and at a fraternity house. After he became a ball boy around age 11, Davis said, he went everywhere with Fine. He fetched cookies for news conferences and shadowed the team.

"I was in there during halftime speeches when Boeheim was kicking over chalkboards and screaming and swearing," Davis said. "I was part of everything for a long time. He's (Boeheim) seen me everywhere."

Davis' claim that he was always hanging around is crucial to his defamation lawsuit, which contends Boeheim "knew or should have known" about the alleged conduct of his assistant.

Davis said Boeheim saw him lounging on Fine's hotel room bed in New Orleans in shorts and a T-shirt during the 1987 Final Four. He said Fine had gotten up to answer the door and was exchanging some paperwork when Boeheim spied him.

"I just remember him ... kind of itching his head and looking, glancing at me, and I just felt like an uneasiness, an uncomfortableness," Davis said.